1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to earth to orbit transportation and more specifically to a telescoping shuttle orbiter.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The space shuttle is currently the primary mode of reusable earth to orbit transportation. The current embodiment consists of an internal cargo bay of fixed volume and an external fuel tank. It is unlikely that payload for a particular mission will correspond to the available fixed volume or to the available lift capability for the selected destination. Thus, the shuttle has either unused volume or does not use its full lift capability. Further, undesirable misalignment of engine thrust and propellant mass exists.
Still another disadvantage of the current art is the inherent lack of system flexibility for developing alternate launch vehicle configurations such as expendable heavy lift versions. In these versions the payload must be moved from side mounted to in-line necessitating alteration of all the basic load paths and therefore alteration of the structure.
A proposed embodiment consists of an internal cargo bay and internal propellant tanks. This embodiment also has the disadvantage of a fixed amount of cargo space. Also, the load paths from the engine through the propellant tanks is complicated, leading to increased structural weights.
A third embodiment is a proposal for an externally mounted cargo bay which appeared in the January 1984 issue of Astronautics and Aeronautics in an article entitled "Booster and Orbiter Configurations" by Wilhite et al. One disadvantage of this "piggy-back" arrangement is the misalignment of the payload mass with the thrust axes of the main engines. Also, this arrangement results in undesirably high acoustic levels from air flow and the main rocket engines. Further, this proposal is only useful if the intended payload exceeds the fixed volume of the internal cargo bay.
Accordingly, it is an object of this invention to efficiently alter the cargo volume of a space shuttle.
It is a further object of this invention to achieve the above object with no undesirable misalignment of engine thrust and propellant mass.
It is a further, object of this invention to provide a system that is easily altered for use as an expendable launch system by elimination of the orbiter shell and substitution of payloads and upper series mounted or strap-on stages.
Other objects and advantages of this invention will become apparent in the specification and drawing which follow.